Rules

In short

Pick a 'Fuzzy month' - any 31 day period between July 1 and August 31, 2018

In this fuzzy month, take a minimum of 35 photos, maximum of as many as you want

Make a ebook out of these photographs

Upload it here

Celebrate on your achievement! Your very own photo book!

The lengthier version

Why the 'Fuzzy Month"?

Because that's how they did it first. Because anything fuzzy is cool! Because it makes sense! Here's an excerpt form the original SoFoBoMo rules:"Because we're just getting started, we're doing a fuzzy month. You should pick a 31 day period that starts no earlier than July 1, and ends no later than August 31. In other words, if you start on July 1, your month ends on August 1. Having everyone do it exactly at the same time would be nice, because it would allow for maximum sense of camaraderie, but everyone has different schedules and this fuzzy month start/finish plan buys some of that without the inflexibility.

Why 35 photos?

Another excerpt: "35 - large enough that it can't be flung together from a single afternoon's photography, short enough to be doable. I understand that for some folks 35 is big number. For the folks who have been running photo-a-day photoblogs, it's child's play. 35 is a reasonable compromise. It's the number of photos in the book The Gift of the Commonplace, a book of photographs by Ruth Bernhard. If it's long enough for Ruth Bernhard, it's long enough for us. UPDATE: You can have more that 35 photos if you like."

Can I include photos I've already taken prior to the start of my 31 days?

No. The book should include only text written and photos made (including both exposure and any editing) during the month.

Can I use ideas or plans I had ahead of time?

Yes. Planning ahead, getting hold of equipment or software you plan to use, and learning the skills to put together whatever book-like thing is the final result are all things that you can do in advance. But you have to take the photos and write the text in that one month.

What qualifies as a completed photo book?

The goal is a nicely formatted PDF / ebook with the photos in it. That means the book might range from just a PDF assembled with the automated PDF merge in Photoshop / Lightroom all the way to a ready to send off to the POD publisher document assembled with Quark Express or Adobe InDesign. I don't think it's a problem to have a broad range of what's acceptable; NaSoAlMo accepts any sort of recording at all, from an answering machine up through studio recordings. People will set their goal to match their own interests and level, which is probably a Good Thing.

You could post the book on your website or ours, if you like, or arrange for someone else to put it on the web, or email it around, or publish a PDF of the receipt for printing it. Or you could just finish the book, post another comment on this page saying you'd completed it, and there you are.

All I need to do to prove that I finished a book is post a comment? Won't that make it easy to cheat?

Yes, it will. This is like playing solitaire - the satisfaction is almost entirely in winning, and if you cheat, you only cheat yourself.